39/52 - Brownies and Cream

Brownies and Cream

I was running out of time for this weeks entry for the project and didn't have any idea as to what I was going to shoot. Coming up with a new idea every week is probably the hardest part of this exercise. I opted to photograph one of the Brownies which my wife had baked earlier in the day. I'm glad I photographed them when I did because they didn't last much longer.

Lighting setup shots inside. 

Lighting Setup - Brownies and Cream

The main light for this photograph was form a Canon 580 EX II fired at 1/8th through a shoot-through umbrella. The umbrella was placed slightly behind the Brownie.

The angle of the main light meant the front of the Brownie was in shadow. To only light this area I used a Canon 430 EX II fired through a grid spot at 1/16th. The grid spot allows you to control the light from a strobe and only light a very small area. The highlighted area in the photograph below was lit by a grid spot.

A Brownie only lit by a grid spot

Stohrer - A 300 year old patisserie

Macaroons at Stohrer - Paris, France 

A few days into the Paris leg of our trip we visited a patisserie named Stohrer. It was conveniently located five minutes away from where we stayed and we ended up visiting it quite frequently! The patisserie was opened by Nicolas Stohr, one of King Louis the XV's pastry chefs, in 1730.  The shop itself has not moved for 300 years.

Read on for more info and images after the jump.

More snacks at Stohrer - Paris, France

We pretty much wanted to try everything in the store and I'm almost certain we came close. Most evenings we would stop by the patisserie on the way back to the apartment and pick up a selection of pastries. The eclairs and macaroons (pictured above), in particular, were amazing.

Ham on the bone at Stohrer - Paris, France

The facade and the interiors make the store a historical monument in itself as it is decorated with murals. These designs were created in 1860 by a painter named Paul Baudry who also painted the decorations in the grand foyer of Opera de Paris.

Window display at Stohrer - Paris, France

Some of the items on the menu are still made using moulds from the 19th Century.

Stohrer - Paris, France

These images were taken with the canon 7D and the 24-105mm lens.

Havelock Place Bungalow - Food Photography

Bread & Butter

This post is a bit different from the usual. I took a few shots of the Food at the Havelock Place Bungalow in December and in this post I will describe how each of the five shots were taken and lit. All the shots were taken with a Canon 50mm f1.8 lens mounted on a 7D More info after the jump.

The shot above was taken with an aperture of 3.5 at 1/50th of a second. I wanted to give the shot some depth and therefore didn't use the flash on camera. Instead, I used a canon 430EX fired at around 1/32 from camera left. This gave the image the desired depth as it created shadows. It also created a few highlights on the glasses which also added to the image.

Coconut and Crab Risotto

An aperture of 3.2 and a shutter speed of 1/125th were used to capture this image. This one was a bit trickier to light due to the shape of the coconut and the fact that I had only one flash. The flash was fired from camera right at about 1/32. I feel there are too many dark areas in this image. In hindsight I should have either left the shutter opened for a bit longer for the ambient light to brighten up the image or used a white serviette from the left of the camera to reflect the flash and lighten up the left hand side of the image.

Seafood Laksa

I positioned the flash behind the subject for this image as I wanted to go for a slightly different look. Firing the flash from behind the bowl helped define the rim of the bowl. It also defined the surface of the Laksa by creating shadows. The flash almost caused the highlights of this image to be blown but in my opinion this makes the viewer focus on the Laksa itself rather than get distracted by the other plates which are visible.

Jaggery Ice Cream

The glass which the Ice Cream was served in was chilled and drops of water had formed on the outside. I wanted to try and use the flash to accentuate these drops. In order to do this I shot the flash at around 1/16th through a white cloth serviette to even out the light. The flash was shot from Camera right and slightly behind the subject.  The aperture used was around f 9.0 and the shutter speed was 1/15. I used this combination to reduce the effect of the flash and bring up the background with the ambient.

Lemon Tart and Vanilla Ice Cream

An aperture of f 6.3 and a shutter speed of 1/80th of a second were used to capture this image. The flash was shot at 1/64 from camera left. I had to bring the aperture down to 6.3 in order to control the highlights on the Ice Cream. I wanted to use the flash to define the edges of the Lemon Tart and the Ice Cream. To do this I needed hard light.